Ajax (AR 6) - Naval Cruise Book

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This, our fourth and present Ajax was commissioned on 30 October 1943. On her first deployment in Pearl Harbor on December 16, 1943. Onboard were 18 officers, 700 men in repair, and an estimated crew of 2,500 (so those of you who thought it was crowded this West Pac ... ). On 26 January, Ajax departed Pearl Harbor, her assignments there completed, enroute for Funafuti, Ellice Islands. She crossed the equator for the first time on 29 January and the International date line on 31 January, with the traditional ceremonies on both occasions. Ajax ' s next mission was in Eniwetok. There she worked on battleships, auxiliary ships and cruisers all through August 1944. While there, Ajax tended a cruiser which had a disease called bacillary dysentery aboard. A number of Ajax crewmembers picked up the disease. The following is a quote from a crewmember who was aboard Ajax at the time, At one time we had several men on sick list . . . the crew was given their sulfaquanadyne pills in the cafeteria line. At first you could find lots of pills on the deck where men had ditched them. Then a man died, and the boys started using their pills. A second man died and they started stealing them from one another ... we were out of action as a repair ship for about six weeks. While in Leyte Gulf, May of 1945, the Ajax along with the Jason repaired typhoon damage to the USS BENNINGTON, the entire collapsed section of the Bennington ' s flight deck was cut away and replaced. At the end of WWII, Ajax returned to Pearl Harbor. An Ajax officer who was sent ahead to Pearl to arrange leave parties for Ajax crewmembers, quoted: When I presented my orders and list, a Lieutenant at the desk said ' I ' m sorry but there are 65,000 men on ships in the bay awaiting land transportation and your men will just have to wait. I can only regard Ajax as just another ship. ' A jCaptain sitting a couple of desks away heard him and asked him to repeat the name of the ship. f cgn he Lieutenant said Ajax, the Captain said Tor two years that ship has been doing things for other pedf le and now someone is going to do something for them. ' The Ajax was taken care of, even the men with the longest distance to travel got home for Christmas 1945. jax ' s homeport became San Diego after WWII. Between 1950 and 1958, she made five tours of duty to the orient. During her sixth tour Ajax received orders to be homeported in Sasebo, Japan, hrough the ne: j0n yea jax provided support to the Seventh Fleet. In February 1970 Ajax ice ived W O! WmTlaf rWfcprt would be changed to San Diego, CA. On the morning of August 6. -J79 . A jgy edjrnoW roiego harbor. Since that time, she has made many more deployments to th© WesternPacific and teji ded.a countless. number of ships here at home. ilAiax haltagain CLrov) (h vaiqe to th w has logged fhe hours of hard work any years of service. tfU-S. N| v- | || ' »i ' j l ia .b 1986 West Pac. piMI thej toretain the reputation which the Ajax has built over I

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They had guitars back then AJAX CO meets the Royal Court Scuttlebutt During AJAX ' s early adventures in the South Pa- cific, rumors were circulating in San Pedro that she had been sunk by a Japanese submarine. The rumors even had the strike pinned down to the stbd. side, frame 41. The rumors also said there were a few survivors and those who did survive were given Navy Crosses and spot promotions. Capt. Brown, first CO. of AJAX wrote a letter letting everyone know at home that Nothing of evil or horror has befallen us ... and with that ending all panic caused by the damaging rumor. 1940s Beauties